Pages

Monday, June 11, 2012

Children & Priests & Lesbians... Oh My!

I don’t know how much I’ve already told you about this, but I am telling you now. There is a Bible on our nightstand. There is a Crucifix in the den. Not a Cross, mind you. No, a Crucifix, which is like the Cross that you would expect Christians to place in prominent locations in their homes, in their courts, and in their classrooms, except that a Crucifix comes with a little something extra.

A Crucifix comes with a tiny dying man-god nailed to it.

He might already be dead. It is sort of difficult to tell.

Either way, he is in the den now. Hanging there. Up until now, I thought we had a tacit agreement to keep dying things and portrayals of dying things out of the den completely. So religion has really already begun to change our household in ways both big and small.

There is a Bible on the nightstand, there is a Crucifix in the den, and this past weekend, there was a priest in the dining room. A Roman Catholic priest came into our home. A real live man of the cloth, with the little collar, the bemused nodding, the whole bit. I believe it might have been part of a surprise home inspection. Do Catholics do those? Nobody expects the Catholic Home Inspection!

To be honest, this priest, he was a perfectly nice man. He did not try to exorcise anything or anyone, but instead shared our food, shared our wine, flipped through the family photo albums… And then he spoke with the kids.

He spoke with the kids one at a time. Alone. [Dear Reader, don’t go there.]

And while he spoke with the kids one at a time and alone, I discovered it was a perfect time for me to iron clothes for the week within listening distance of the conversations. Of course, he mostly seemed to be fishing for ways in which our deviant, deviant lifestyle might be screwing the little tykes up. And furthermore, most of this potential screwing up seemed to involve gender roles, which, as we all know, were invented not by society, but rather by God.

First, he spoke with Rachel, who is our nine-year old. Sadly, the noise from the AC made this conversation virtually inaudible. So for the conversation with Angela, who is our seven-year old, I went and turned the AC up several degrees to keep it off.

What follows is that conversation in relevant part, with commentary where appropriate.

PRIEST: Where is your mom, Angela?

ANGELA: She’s upstairs.

PRIEST: Where is your dad?

ANGELA: He died.

[NOTE: This is wrong. Dana’s husband/Rachel’s father died before I met her. Angela came along later.]

PRIEST: Now, who is that who is ironing clothes in the other room?

ANGELA: That’s KayKay!

PRIEST: Is that your dad?

ANGLEA: No, KayKay is a lady.

[NOTE: Yay! I’m a lady!]

PRIEST: Why don’t you call KayKay “Mom”?

ANGELA: Because. It’s a name. If my name was Angela and your name was Angela and Rachel’s name was Angela, and somebody went, “Angela!” then everybody would turn around.

PRIEST: And what are Mom and KayKay to each other?

ANGELA: My parents.

PRIEST: Of course. But I mean, what are they to each other? Your mom is KayKay’s...?

ANGELA: Wife. Where is YOUR wife?

PRIEST: I don’t have a wife. I chose to marry the Church.

ANGELA [sounding doubtful]: They let you do that?

PRIEST: Yes. It is just a different way of spending my life. Instead of giving my life to another person, I have chosen to give my life to God.

ANGELA [pause]: Okay.

PRIEST: And Angela, who helps you with your homework?

ANGELA: Mostly KayKay.

PRIEST: Who talks to you when you get a bad grade?

ANGELA: I don’t get bad grades.

PRIEST: Of course not. Who corrects you when you get into a fight with your sister?

PRIEST: When you get older, do you think you’ll probably have a boyfriend or do you think you will probably have a girlfriend? Which do you think?

ANGELA: Um… a boyfriend. You don’t have a boyfriend or a girlfriend?

PRIEST: No, I don’t, because-

ANGELA: Because you’re married to the Church!

PRIEST: That’s right.

ANGELA: If you had a girlfriend, then you would have somebody to eat with. Then you wouldn’t have to come to our house to eat.

I don’t know if those were the right answers or if they were the wrong answers. I don’t know what answers the good padre was expecting to hear. But it has now been two days since our dinner with the priest. We have yet to have Child Protective Services or Opus Dei beating down our door.

It could be that the verdict is just not in yet.

It could be that the Church wants nothing more to do with us. That it’s washing its hands of us and our immortal souls.

It has now been two days since our dinner with the priest and there have been no lightning strikes near our house. No reports of anyone being burned at the stake. Houston has not been burned to the ground.

But who knows what tomorrow will bring? The re-Catholicization of Dana has left everyone way outside of their comfort zones.

64 comments:

I am gonna have to say she gave the right answers, even if Mr. Priest didn't agree with them. Or maybe he did and he just can't say so. Some priests are cool like that. When my cousin adopted her daughter she wanted her godparents to be her brother and his husband. The priest's response to her was that of course that was OK because they are her family. Mind you, the baptism was done with no one else around...

"The re-Catholicization of Dana has left everyone way outside of their comfort zones."

Including me. Srsly. You and Dana need a vacation. And when I say "vacation" I'm talking psychedelic tourism. And you get a choice. You can go to Latin American and slip Dana some Ayahuasca, or you can go to Africa and tell her that the Ibogaine clinic you've signed her up for is really a high-end day-spa. I don't really see that you have any other options.

And where the fuck are the husbands during all this? Jesus H. Christ they are making us men look like wussies. You and the husbands have to act and act quickly to SAVE THIS (polygamous) MARRIAGE!!!

So darn funny. LOLYou left a child with a catholic priest alone? Oh girl child. You just dont challenge religion, you even challenge science and DNA. Your daughter carries your intelligence and bravery and honesty and courage. Bravo!And about the crucifix,have you seen hindu gods, it would look more like opposite of gods - with machetes and weapons over a deadbody or with chopped off blood dripping head.Reminds me of movie "Outsourced" dialogue.Todd:I'm pretty sure there is a painting of her in my room. It feels like she following me around.Asha: That's Kali, the goddess of destruction. Todd:Why would you want the goddess of destruction in your car?

"Married to church and god" - actually in Hinduism - the Indian Geishas - "Dasis" are told to have been married to gods. Once they attain puberty people will place a idol next to the girl as her husband and will tie the knot and that's it, she is married to god and from that day on, she is to sleep with god's own images - Kings, Noble, Royal men and Lords and all.

Religion - the only place where prostitution, pan handling, violence and inhumaness everything is just not tolerated but revered and encouraged under "holy disguise".

It's pretty damn amazing how so many mythologies and religions carry the same basic archetypes, images, and patterns, isn't it?

Joseph Campbell's "The Masks of God" is really good in examining that.

Christianity even had to grapple with that eventually, as it became obvious that the basic Christ event had... reflections in other, earlier religions. I can't remember what they call that. Precursory shadows?

There are more aspects unique to Christ than critics commonly give him credit for (I'm guessing Apuleius and Bellatrix could point out the pre-Christian pagan parallels well).

I don't know. I don't pretend to have the answers. I don't even have a position.

Mask of God - I remember that one, I think I read the cliff notes one for that book :(But let me check it out this time the whole book.

You arent a teacher? you are better than any of my teachers I paid to teach me and I learn a lot from your posts than from them.

Yep, comparative mythology and religion study would confirm that no religion or culture had ever held the patent for Moronoism or Mormonism or pervertism either. They were everywhere, they are everywhere.

Katy, i think this is the third or fourth time i`ve had to reprimand and tell you off about cluttering-up and polluting your otherwise marvellous site with absurd and idiotic religious hogwash and nonsense, i dont want to have to waste my time doing this again Katy so let this be the last time alright, you have been warned my dear girl ! ! !.

Katy, you know where you said "[Dear reader, dont go there]", well you obviously said that because you know the truth about what really goes on in peoples minds (especially the sexual stuff), right ! ! !. Now Katy, why do you think we`ve created such a literal sexually repressed hell-on-earth for ourselves where people actually seem to prefer lies and hypocrisy over the truth ?, i really want to know your opinion Katy. What you wrote proves once again that what i`m always saying is true, future historians will indeed look back and remember our period of history as "THE TIME OF SEXUAL REPRESSION", and we`re the poor bastards who had to live through it ! ! !.

I don't know if "repressed" is the right word. I volunteer at free legal advice clinics with Dana a lot, and these folks come in with child custody cases where there are upwards of 8 potential dads. Or where they are paying child support to five different women.

Repression doesn't seem to be the issue.

Sexual hang-ups, maybe.

People seem to have a weird relationship with sex whether or not they are actually getting it.

Angela is a GENIUS! And you two are obviously doing a great job if she was able to confound a priest with her brilliant logic. That's a smart kid. Her response to "why don't you call Kaykay 'mom'," was better than what I would have come up with (but then again, I kill a lot of brain cells on a daily basis).By the way, Richard Dawkins comments here!?! Holy crap! I mean, "respectful secular crap"!

First of all, I'm so impressed that Richard Dawkins drops by to slap your wrist for cluttering up your site with religious nonsense. Wish he'd visit my place, there's so much of that going on lately!

Having been raised in the church (as in The Church) and served as an altar boy (altar, not altered, thank you...) I can relate to the priestly visits. My dad never set foot in a church as far as I know, but that didn't stop our priest (well, mom's, actually... I went to mass because she outweighed me and threatened the wrath of mom if I bucked her on it) from dropping by to have a beer with the old man. They'd break out a bottle of Jack, go down into the basement and tap dad's keg and shoot pool. We were told to stay upstairs, because it wouldn't do for the altar boy and his little sister to see the priest drunk and singing with my dad the heretic. I stopped believing these visits were made in an effort to get my dad to come to church long before mom stopped telling me that was what was going on. Actually, the priest came to see dad because there weren't many places in town he could get hammered and tell dirty jokes with impunity.

Maybe that's why I'm not on the Vatican's payoff list today, unmolested as a kid? "Can't mess with young Robert, his dad has the best man-cave in the county!"

Your post made me laugh out loud... and your daughter has it going on, ma'am. Watch her, she's going to change the world for the rest of us!

My ex-bro-in-law works for Catholic Social Services and one night he invited me to come over to his place to play poker. One of the players that night was a priest from a church in Nashville, and that guy told some of the raunchiest jokes I've ever heard. Like he informed me that night, Priests and Christmas trees both have decorative balls.

I had a priest as a professor in a class a couple years back. We'd make bets at the beginning of class about how long it would take him during any given class period to work the topic of testicles into whatever he was talking about.

But Katy, once again you didn`t actually address "The Hamster's" specific question, when he said that he thinks future historians will look back at our period of history (the 20th century, and even now well into the 21st century) and remember it as "THE TIME OF SEXUAL REPRESSION", i wanted to know whether you specifically agreed with that or not ?.

I have a lot of difficulty with revealed religions in general. Any religion that involves the idea of the truth being handed to a select few humans during history and then expected to percolate up from there.

I have a great deal of difficulty believing that's how the force behind the universe would work.

Well, I went to a Catholic School. Not necessarily because I was Catholic, but because they were the closest school with a decent hockey team. Anyway, from the teachings they offered at my school, it seems that Catholicism has learned that they need to be accepting of everyone if there is even a prayer of the religion surviving. Despite attending a Catholic school, there were students from all walks of life. The priests never forced religion on anyone and encouraged people to choose their own path.

That being said, I abandoned Catholicism because I attended the Confraternity of Christian Doctrine when I was younger, and they were all unreformed Catholic teachers, and they were absolute dicks (poetic as it may sound). And, to save you the trouble of reading any more of my fairly pointless rambling, Angela sounds like a very intelligent kid!

It's always sounded to me that there is a fairly big mark in the sand across the Sixties with the Church. I mean, I had always heard about how catholic kids weren't allowed to enter the houses of non-Catholic friends and stuff...

But I think the Vatican II Council in the Sixties changed a lot of the odd stuff that people associated with the Church.

Mr. Dawkins, I fear your efforts are two thousand years too late. As things currently stand in world affairs, organized religion IS the problem, not the solution. Having been drug to a Catholic Church as a child, despite abandoning the faith with the same certainty with which I abandoned the belief in Santa, the Tooth Fairy, The Easter Bunny, and intelligent life in the state of Alabama, I've spent my adult life baffled that anyone continues to buy into the bullshit. I think I was about ten when I had an epiphany and concluded it was all made up by adults to manipulate children into good behavior. All the last 47 years have done is reaffirm that recognition of coercion. I'm convinced we will never become a truly enlightened species until weevolve beyond superstition and organized religion. When I ask my devout friends to list the positives religion brings to the modern world, then counter their list with the negatives (from jihad to systemic child molestation to the insistence upon denying empirical science- with all of the damage THAT ignorance fuels) the balance scales tend to tilt my direction. Personally, I fear that if I were forced to enter a church now my body would react the way Damien's did in "The Omen"... with my head spinning around like Linda Blair's in "The Exorcist"! Katy's a saint for putting up with my long-winded pontifications ("Leave the Pope out of this!") I'll take my soapbox home as I go... sorry.

The Anglicans have been in an interesting position as regards the controversial issues of the day, though.

They've adapted head-on and paid the price for it. They ordain both women and gay folks, don't they?

I know a Catholic priest here in town who used to be an Anglican bishop, only he apparently thought they were getting a little too progressive, so he bolted - wife in tow! - and became a Catholic priest. He has now been designated by the Vatican as the dude who gets to travel around the country helping entire Anglican PARISHES that feel that Anglicanism is too liberal covert to Catholicism.

squatlo, just with regards to "The Exorcist": The power of Linda Blair compels me to pull her knickers down and shove my knob up her bum (as the bird was at the time "The Exorcist" was filmed in 1972, not as the bird is now obviously).

And you say the priest didn't perform an exorcism? Huh. I suppose they only do that for depression and anxiety. At least, that's what happened to me when I was a teen. Most people will never know how cold holy water can be until it's dumped on their heads by a screaming man.

The Catholics train a few of their priests in how to do exorcisms, which is weird in and of itself. It's relatively rare from my understanding.

However, there are some of your... independent pentacostal folks who tend to do it more often. If you google "exorcism" and "death", you'll see there have been a few cases of KIDS dying while somebody is trying to exorcise them... including a couple examples in the United States!

It would have to be scary for a kid, regardless of whether it's done right or not...

i bet you anything that when the priest said he was "married to the church", angela envisioned him in a tux and the church in a bridal gown, smooching as they are pronounced husband and church. because that's what i did.

Angela had some great responses. As the others have mentioned, there are a FEW cool priests out there. I've met a few who were actually a little more liberal with things, such as being gay. "It's not my job to judge people," said one.

On the other hand, I once went to a funeral with Brandon, and the priest assumed we were a gay couple and scorned us. He also had a huge lisp, though, so I'm assuming there was some repressed feelings there?

It seems a lot like moral probing to me. It's wrong to guide a child through an agenda she is not conscious of. Hell, the agenda itself is wrong.

By the way, I accidentally removed my Blogger profile (but not my blog) and I think that deleted all the comments I wrote with it (except, I've found out, Disqus). I'm sorry! I always enjoy our conversations and I hate to think that they are gone.

I hope they are better off with me around than they'd be without me around. No parent is ever sure, I guess, but I really hope that they don't resent us later on.

I had a friend who installed disqus on his page a while back, and it put all of his old comments into never-neverland. He uninstalled it, and the comments reappeared. I'd hate to lose all of my comments!

“You deserve to be gassed or shot, depending on the circumstances. You're a health risk, a risk to children, and a risk to society. Sick, disgusting dyke. Crawl off and DIE.”– Paula A. R. DeAngelis, PhD